Rizeena rebounds in Coronation Stakes

Rizeena rebounded from a disappointing seventh-place finish in the English 1000 Guineas, her 3-year-old debut, to capture the Group 1 Coronation Stakes, the feature on Friday’s Royal Ascot card.

Rosalind, the Ken McPeek-trained American filly in the Coronation, stumbled leaving the starting gate and unseated jockey Kieren Fallon.

Rizeena had a busy 2013 campaign and was one of the best 2-year-old fillies in England or Ireland last year, winning the Group 1 Moyglare Stud Stakes and placing in two other Group 1 races.

She had turned in an uninspiring performance while running down the straight course at Newmarket last month but was always in contention racing one mile around Ascot’s round course Friday, taking the lead with a little more than a furlong to race and holding clear a late outside run from Lesstalk in Paris to win by three-quarters of a length.

Euro Charline finished another three-quarters of a length back in third, while the favored Lightning Thunder never got untracked and checked in ninth.

Clive Brittain trains Rizeena, by Ifraaj, for Sheikh Rashid Dalmook al Maktoum, and she was ridden to victory by Ryan Moore. The time for the mile on good-to-firm going was a modest 1:40.73.

Also on the Friday card, trainer John Gosden won his third group stakes of the Royal Ascot meeting when longshot Eagle Top closed powerfully to win the Group 2 King Edward, a 1 1/2-mile race for 3-year-olds.

Making just his third start, Eagle Top had finished fourth last out in a Leicester handicap, but Gosden said the colt’s blood work following the race showed something had been amiss, giving his connections the confidence to step Eagle Top up in class. He responded with a last-to-first rally under William Buick that netted a 3 1/4-length win over the favored Adelaide.

Eagle Top, a Lady Bamford homebred by Pivotal, was timed in 2:27.98 and could have the St. Leger Stakes as a Group 1 goal this summer.

Finally, the Wesley Ward-trained Sunset Glow set the pace and ran well but could not hold off the late-running Cursory Glance in the Group 3 Albany Stakes, a six-furlong race for 2-year-old fillies.

Ridden patiently on the lead by Victor Espinoza, Sunset Glow turned back a bid from the favored Patience Alexander but had no answer when Cursory Glance, a Kempton all-weather winner in her only previous start, came running late.